Learn from Montgomery Bus Boycott in Designing Resistance Pledges

I think it’s worthwhile to compare the Resolution that launched the Montgomery
Bus Boycott to that vague anti-war “Appeal”
I wrote about on
Saturday. It shows the difference
between a call-to-action and a call-to-inaction, between a campaign for change
and a same-old-complaint, between making something happen and having an
opinion.

The resolution formally spelled out the segregation policy of the city of
Montgomery and specifically the Montgomery City Lines, Incorporated bus
company, and then made very specific demands — not of them, but of every
citizen in Montgomery, first and foremost those citizens who were
assembled to listen to and vote on the resolution (here somewhat edited for
clarity from the version in the transcript of the meeting recording):

That every citizen in Montgomery, regardless of race, color or creed,
refrain from riding buses owned and operated in the city of Montgomery by
Montgomery Lines, Incorporated, until some arrangement has been worked out
between said citizens and the Montgomery City Lines, Incorporated.

That every person owning or who has access to an automobile will use their
automobiles in assisting other persons to get to work without charge.

That the employers of persons whose employees live a great distance from
them, as much as possible, afford transportation for your own
employees.

That the Negro citizens of Montgomery are ready and willing to send a
delegation of citizens to the Montgomery City Lines, Incorporated, to
discuss their grievances and to work out a solution for the same.

Be it further resolved, that we have not, we are not, and we have no
intentions of using any unlawful means or any intimidation to persuade persons
not to ride the Montgomery City Lines buses. However, we call upon your
conscience, both moral and spiritual, to give your whole-hearted support to
this worthy undertaking. We believe we have a just complaint and we are
willing to discuss this matter with the proper authorities.

This resolution was put to a vote at “the first mass meeting of the Montgomery
Improvement Association” and the vote was overwhelmingly in favor. King then
addressed the assembly:

You have voted. And you have done it with a great deal of enthusiasm, and I
want to express my appreciation to you, on behalf of everybody here. Now let
us go out to stick together and stay with this thing until the end. Now it
means sacrificing, yes, it means sacrificing at points. But there are some
things that we’ve got to learn to sacrifice for. And we’ve got to come to the
point that we are determined not to accept a lot of things that we have been
accepting in the past.

So I’m urging you now. We have the facilities for you to get to your jobs. And
we are putting, we have the cabs there at your service, automobiles will be at
your service. And don’t be afraid to use up any of the gas. If you have it, if
you are fortunate enough to have a little money, use it for a good cause. Now
my automobile is gonna be in it, it has been in it. And I’m not concerned
about how much gas I’m gonna use. I want to see this thing work.

And we will not be content until oppression is wiped out of Montgomery, and
really out of America. We won’t be content until that is done. We are merely
insisting on the dignity and worth of every human personality. And I don’t
stand here, I’m not arguing for any selfish person. I’ve never been on a bus
in Montgomery. But I would be less than a Christian if I stood back and said,
because I don’t ride the bus, I don’t have to ride a bus, that it doesn’t
concern me.

The city told the taxi drivers it was illegal to give discounted fares to the
boycotters. The cops started giving out nuisance traffic tickets to cars that
volunteers used to shuttle people outside of the bus system. The city
pressured insurance companies to rescind car insurance for cars involved in
these volunteer shuttles. Boycotters were physically attacked and brought up on
conspiracy charges. King’s house was firebombed. Through it all, the boycott
continued and was eventually victorious.

It took all that to get bus drivers to stop telling black people to stand up
and move to the back so a white person could rest his bum, something any
sensible person would know without being reminded was beneath the dignity of
everyone concerned. How much more effort do you think it will take to stop the
war in Iraq or the mass incarceration in America? How long do you think it
would take the followers of a toothless Appeal like the one I discussed on
Saturday, or the
same old timid tactics
of today’s peace movement to do the trick?

Incidentally, both Georgia and Alabama used their tax laws to harass King.
As with Jesus, who was also brought up on poorly-supported tax evasion
charges, this isn’t necessarily evidence that King was resisting taxes, just
that the tax cop is the meanest dog in the junkyard and the best one to sic
on your political enemies.

While Nicholas Confessore tries to
break the code
and discover what’s going on behind the scenes at Dubya’s tax reform plot,
Lew Rockwell takes a
look at The Tax-Reform Racket and concludes
that Dubya’s plot to mess with the tax code really boils down to an
opportunity for the Republican Party to shake down the various concerns who
want to see their favorite loopholes preserved from the coming
“simplification.” That’s the most sensible prediction yet about the results of
the coming fiasco. Rockwell’s column ends with this insight:

Let me close with a proposal that we abolish the income tax. It took in $873
billion last year. If we cut the budget by that amount, we would end with a
completely gutted federal budget, right? Actually, that is not true. We would
end up with a federal budget of about $1.5 trillion, where it was in
the last year of Clinton’s second term. If anyone
thinks that the federal government was too small back then, I can only
recommend a complete education in economics, politics, and the truth about
human freedom.

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